Video: 2024 Hyundai Palisade Calligraphy Night Edition Review: Bling on a Budget

(upbeat music) The Hyundai Palisade last got a big refresh for the 2023 model year, but the Calligraphy Night edition we have here really just continues one of the most impressive things we find about the Palisade: its high level of premium features in a family-oriented vehicle. One of the most impressive things, I think, about the palisade is its interior. It's classy, I think. I wouldn't call it necessarily a luxury interior, but it has luxury elements. Like, you look at the dash trim. It's got this tuxedo pin striping, which reminds me of a Mercedes Maybach, but not quite as nice, I think. Yeah, I think that works because that's a much more expensive vehicle, and you know, you did touch on the fact that it looks nice, and I would say looking is the key word here. I think it kind of falls apart when you get close. You touch the material. You kind of futz around with it. But yeah, overall presentation does look nice. I will say, you did like the cloth, correct? I do. Yeah, I'm not the biggest fan. I preferred its sister Telluride interior with the leather, although I do appreciate that this is a little bit less corny interior, a little bit less cheesy than the Telluride. You see, I like the fabric thing 'cause every other vehicle here has either vinyl or leather, but fabric you never see in a higher end vehicle anymore, but if it's done well, I think it really does look nice. And we have to admit this is one of the most comfortable interiors here certainly. It's one of the largest. The front seat comfort is excellent. Second row comfort is really quite good as well. And it's not too bad to get to the back in that third row and once you're there, three mode seat warmers. I couldn't believe how toasty my butt was back there when I was testing this thing out. And it's, yeah, like I said, not too bad to get back there, and yeah. You said it's got that the third row is actually heated. One of the things that's impressed us most is the amount of luxury features in this vehicle. It's got heated first, second, and third row seats. It's got power folding second and third row seats as well. Massaging front seats. They even have an extension for the seat bottom on the front as well. That's stuff you don't normally find in these kinds of vehicles, but it looks good and it feels good to me. One of the other things we really like about the Palisade is the amount of technology that's in this thing, but it's usable technology, like the displays. It's got tons of great big digital displays, but it doesn't put everything in the touchscreen. It has a lot of actual hard buttons as well, which is something we really like in a vehicle. You know, the one part of the hard buttons, and I agree, I do really usually like hard buttons for the seat controls and the climate controls, but I will say I was not the biggest fan of the buttons for the shifter, or gear selector. I'd much rather prefer the Telluride, which, remember, is functionally the same vehicle as this underneath the wrapper. I definitely prefer the standard automatic gear shifter in the Telluride rather than the buttons. It's just easier to use. It is. It's easier to use. It's more intuitive. You don't have to try and hunt to figure out which button you wanna push when you're trying to either pull out into traffic or back out onto the street. Yeah, you know, I think an underappreciated control with buttons would be the second row and trying to toggle that to get into the third row and to stow it. I found it very intuitive, very easy. And even from the third row, I was able to figure out kind of where it was without having to ask outside help. And I will say, outside of buttons, I really like the digital driver display. It's configurable. When you go into different drive modes, it either spices it up or calms it down, but you're not locked into that, which I also liked. You can configure it as you want, and if it does get a little confusing or kind of cluttered, I did like the head up display, which has all the pertinent information. Yeah, it's all nicely packaged. It's nicely packaged and it's easy to use. I mean, it's big and it's clear. The touch screen is right here. It's up high. It's so simple to push and do what you need it to do, but it's not confusing. It's not you trying to figure out how to use anything in this vehicle. It's simple. It's intuitive. It looks good. It's well done. Yeah, I agree. Despite that the Palisade won our test, and there's a lot of things we really do like about it, there are two areas that at least you and I don't think are so great with the new Hyundai Palisade. One of them, for you anyway, is the engine. Ah, yeah, the engine. I must say, I really do like the transmission that's hooked up to this. No problem. Smooth shifting, all that. You know, the fact is I don't really like this naturally aspirated V6, and it's not the configuration because most of the vehicles here have a naturally aspirated V6. I just found this one kind of old. I believe the same in the Telluride. A little peaky. And you know, this is gonna be used to haul family, friends, luggage, all that kind of good stuff. I think it doesn't have enough low torque that I usually like in large SUVs like this, so I really did prefer, at least the engines, the turbocharged four cylinders of the Atlas and the Accent. Yeah, for me, the thing that I'm really still kind of confounded that this thing doesn't have is wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. I mean, this thing is several years into its existence, and they still haven't figured out a way to put wireless Apple CarPlay in the large multimedia system. I don't know how hard this could possibly be at this point. If they've had plenty of time to figure this out. We're expecting it's probably gonna come with the next generation version, but it's still not here. It's not on the Telluride either, and that's just I think a glaring omission for me. I think it's quite surprising since this is one of the most feature-rich vehicles in the whole lineup here. While the Palisade nabbed only a handful of outright wins, it proved highly competitive in a wide range of categories. And it even won our value scoring thanks to its impressive roster of premium features for the money. Now speaking of money, this is the most expensive vehicle in the test at an as tested price of $55,600, but that's not much more than the Atlas and it's within a few grand of the other vehicles. So if premium features are a must have in your next family vehicle, you've gotta check out the 2024 Hyundai Palisade.